Dress Code
by Mynuet
Summary: Lina and Amelia are violating the dress code by wearing too many clothes. What's the reaction to their new costumes? L/G Z/A


Dress Code  
by Sharlene  
  
Gourry knocked on a door inside Ye Olde Tavern and Inn. He'd gotten through the entire menu twice before realizing Lina hadn't come down to breakfast, and he was worried. "Lina! You want breakfast?"  
  
"Go away! I'm not coming out and you can't make me!" The sound of something hitting the door emphasized that the small red haired sorceress really didn't feel like company. Gourry scratched his head, shrugged and headed towards the stairs to go down to the common room to finish eating. Before he was past the top step, he heard Lina screech, "Send Amelia up here, NOW."  
  
Amelia looked up from where she was finishing her breakfast, having learned to start early to avoid the rush. The thought of running away entered her mind, but was brushed aside by the unjustness inherent in leaving a friend at her time of need. She sighed heavily and went upstairs, feeling in her bones that this was not going to be a good morning. Her bones were right. "Miss Lina? Are you okay?  
  
"Do I LOOK okay?! Does this really look OKAY to you, Amelia?" Lina stood with her hands on her hips, chest heaving from the exertion of taking out her anger on the contents of the room. Amelia blinked as she took in the full effect of what Lina was wearing.  
  
Or, to be more precise, not wearing. Lina was wearing her normal yellow bikini and bandeau, but not the tunic and pants that she normally wore underneath them. Her demon's blood talismans were still there, but the one normally at her collar was cinching the bandeau in between her breasts, and the one on her sword belt looked somewhat silly, as the bikini started just below it. Her shoulder guards were gone, and her cape had seemingly sprouted a small embroidered pink scrollwork pattern. Even her gloves and boots were different, a more abbreviated version in the same pink as the new cape decorations. Amelia struggled to find a comment that wouldn't get her killed. "It looks... nice, Miss Lina, but I'm not sure it's you."  
  
Lina snarled and Amelia jumped backwards at the demonstration of pure hostility. "Of course it isn't me, you idiot. Look at the letter on the table."  
  
Amelia nervously edged around where Lina was standing. Waves of anger seemed to roll off the sorceress, creating an almost palpable haze of fury. Amelia picked up the letter and read.  
  
Dear Miss Inverse:  
  
It has come to our attention that you are in violation of subsection 5b(ii) of the Allied Nations Ideal Magic Empire women's dress code. If this is not corrected immediately, we will have no choice but to suspend your license to practice magic within the known realms, and the standard substantial bounty for non-compliance will be placed on you. We do not wish to go to these measures, and we hope that you will continue to be a member in good standing once this little matter is resolved. Attached is a sketch of a preliminary costume selection that should suffice to bring you within the limits of the dress code until such time as you can have a more suitable one designed.   
  
Sincerely,  
Cornelius Futch,   
Director, A.N.I.M.E Central  
  
Amelia read the letter again, just to make sure it really said what she thought it did. Then she scanned it once more as she bit the inside of her lips to keep from giggling. "It'll be okay, Miss Lina. We can go to the dressmaker and have another costume made very quickly."  
  
Lina focused on the princess, taking in the twitching lips and trembling shoulders. An evil smile spread over her face as she said, "There's a letter for you, too."  
  
"WHAT?!? There can't be!" Amelia tore the letter from Lina's hand and ripped it open before scanning the contents and the attached sketch. "They can't do this to me. I'm a PRINCESS! I can't go around looking like THAT!"  
  
Lina laughed. "Oh, it'll be okay, Amelia. We can go to the dressmaker and have another--"  
  
A vein throbbed in Amelia's temple as she interrupted, "MISS Lina, this is NOT funny." She looked at the sketch again and moaned. "There isn't enough cloth there to cover an infant. At least you don't have much to display. If I try to wear this I'll have men following me around everywhere."  
  
The temperature in the room seemed to drop twenty degrees. "What did you say?"  
  
Amelia tried to swallow despite the sudden lack of saliva in her mouth and throat. "It's just that my sister used to have problems with men looking at her breasts..." Amelia broke off as she realized she had taken entirely the wrong tactic.  
  
Lina sniffed. "Breasts or no breasts, you'll be lucky to attract any attention once I walk out there wearing this thing. The great Lina Inverse showing this much leg? I'll have to assign numbers to men wanting to speak to me."  
  
The air crackled with the heat of the glares being exchanged. "I'll bet I get ten times the attention you do! Men never look at flat chested girls like you." A small part of Amelia's mind that was still sane wondered if she had just signed her death warrant. The rest was busy throwing off clothes and getting into her new costume.  
  
"It's a bet."  
  
"Fine!" Amelia stood and put her hands on her hips, glaring at her best friend in the world. "How will we keep score?"  
  
"You take Zel, I'll take Gourry. They'll keep count of how many men we each talk to." Lina thought she could always just tell Gourry a number and he'd accept it. There was no way she was going to lose.   
  
Amelia nodded her agreement, and the walls of the inn shook with the volume each woman used to shout for their partner. Seconds later, the door flew open, and the two men in the party froze in their tracks. Gourry blinked as Lina breezed by, grabbing his hair and saying, "Come on, Gourry, we're going out."  
  
This left Zelgadis and Amelia, the former still frozen as his brain tried to process the input from the optic nerve. Black hair, check. Blue eyes, check. Acres of pearly skin revealed by what looked like a dark blue leather bathing suit with high cut legs and low cut neckline? Does not compute.   
  
Amelia started for the door. "Come on, Mister Zelgadis, we have to go out before Miss Lina gets too big a head start!"   
  
Zelgadis slammed the door shut and stood in front of it with his arms outspread, blocking the way out as if his life depended on it. "You are NOT going out wearing that."  
  
Amelia gave an exasperated humph as she tried in vain to move the man made out of rock. "Mister Zelgadis, this is my new costume, and I need to show it off or I lose the bet! Oh, and you need to keep count of how many men I talk to today."  
  
Zelgadis held fast, the whites of his eyes showing as he tried to ignore the proximity of the barely-dressed princess. /Snow. Think about snow. Gourry in a dress. Lina eating./ The calming thoughts were in vain as Amelia gave a particularly fierce tug and almost jiggled out of her top. "There is no way on this earth that I am letting you speak to any man while you're dressed like that." He took a moment to swipe at the sweat that had gathered on his brow. "Hell, there're some women I wouldn't trust to look at you dressed like that."  
  
Amelia took a step back and stomped a foot, leading his eyes to track down to the high heels tied on with ribbons that crisscrossed up to her knees. He shuddered and closed his eyes, trying once again to think of calming things. He opened his eyes just in time to see her heading for the window, and grabbed her before she could make her escape. Calming thoughts disappeared in the face of an armful of cuddly girl and he pressed her close, kissing her with such heat that she thought her eyelashes would singe. /Gee, if I'd known I'd get this reaction, I'd have dressed like this sooner.../  
  
Meanwhile, around town, Lina was not having a good day. Sure, lots of men were looking at her, and some even started walking towards her, but none of them got close enough to talk to her. She'd turned to look at Gourry to see if he was doing something, but he just smiled innocently, leaving her to wonder what it was about her that didn't attract attention. As soon as her gaze was averted, Gourry's hand went back to his sword and his face settled back into the fierce glare that had made all of Lina's potential suitors decide that they really wanted to live more than they wanted to talk to the half naked redhead. They passed a snack cart and Lina tried to stop, but Gourry shooed her away from it and said firmly, "No ice cream cones today, Lina."  
  
Lina looked at him in confusion, then shrugged. The ice cream looked good, but she needed to concentrate on winning the bet. "Okay, Gourry, I need to talk to a lot of men. What should I do to get attention?"  
  
This was NOT a conversation he wanted to have. "Grow breasts." Gourry said sourly. He got the shock of his life when he looked at Lina and saw her eyes fill with tears. He reached out and grabbed her arm, stopping her and trying to make eye contact. "Lina, I'm sorry, I didn't mean that, it's just-- Yowch!"  
  
Gourry snatched his hand away and shook it in the air, blisters forming where his hand had been in contact with the enraged sorceress. Lina was incandescent with the force of her anger, and as she turned, Gourry could swear he saw a death skull transposed over her delicate features. With a wordless roar the sorceress jumped up and in moves faster than the eye could follow, blackened both of his eyes, loosened several teeth and then slammed both feet into his chest, sending him flying backwards to leave a large dent in a stone wall. Then, with a satisfied sniff, Lina started to walk away.  
  
As soon as she judged she was out of Gourry's sight, her shoulders slumped and she let the tears fall down her cheeks. She had been furious at having to wear this outfit, but the thought of finally being seen as an attractive woman instead of The Enemy of All Who Live had made up for it, a little. Her mirror had said she looked pretty hot in this getup, but not one single person had given her a compliment all day. Other girls got sweethearts who told them they were pretty, but not Lina. She was beginning to wonder if she should try to be more like other girls, but the mental picture of herself wearing a ruffled dress and saying "Gourry Dear" made her laugh and gag at the same time.   
  
A shadow fell on her and she looked up to see a huge man looming over her. Lina shaded her eyes to look up at his face, absently noting his vague resemblance to Prince Phil in size and mustache proportions. She sighed at the thought of having to deal with a bandit on top of everything else, but figured letting loose a few fireballs would help relieve the stress. She was still limbering her fingers in preparation when he fell to his knees in front of her. "Oh, glorious goddess! Your form, your blazing crown of hair, your eyes that shine like fire in the night, all are perfection as has never been seen before on the face of this earth!"  
  
Lina blinked. "That's a new one. Aren't you going to say I'm built like a beanpole and run away from the Bandit Killer?"  
  
"It would be an honor to be killed by such beautiful hands." He took each of her hands in turn and kissed them, first on the backs and then on each fingertip. Lina's mind was still trying to adjust to this unexpected reaction when she saw Gourry approach, still sporting a matched pair of black eyes.  
  
"Oh, you say the nicest things, Mister... What was your name again?" Lina simpered and batted her eyelashes at her admirer, determined to show Gourry that _someone_ thought she was pretty.  
  
A blush crept over the smitten man's face and he bowed his head over Lina's hand. "I am called Nulo, my angel of fire, and I live to serve you." He didn't have a chance to say anything else, as by this time Gourry had gotten close enough to hear and was severely displeased. The unfortunate Nulo was hauled up by the shirtfront and smashed in the face hard enough to make small tweeting birds appear over his head only to fly dizzily and fall to the ground beside him, sharing his swirly eyed misery.  
  
"What'd you do that for?!? He liked me!" Gourry turned to face Lina at that and the look in his eyes made her pause and take a half step back. She gave a nervous giggle and said, "Why don't I- Oof!" Gourry had picked her up and thrown her over his shoulder, and his armor knocked the wind out of her.   
  
Speechlessness never lasted long with Lina. Within seconds she was screeching and lashing out with feet and fists, but he held her securely on his shoulder and ignored her antics. Soon they were at her room in the inn and he dumped her unceremoniously on the bed. She shot him a glare that promised intense pain, but he grabbed her wrists before she could cast a spell. "You can kill me in a minute, Lina. I have something to say first."  
  
"You'd better say your prayers, buster. I'm going to kick your ass so hard your grandparents won't be able to sit down for weeks." Lina tried to pull her wrists from his grasp and kneed him very hard in a very sensitive spot.   
  
Gourry grimaced, but held on. "I deserved that, and I want to apologize for what I said earlier. I was jealous and angry." He let go and backed away, kneeling on the floor and hanging his head. He had intended to bring her back and shake her, kiss her, do something to make her see him as a man, but when it came down to it, he simply couldn't. He loved her and respected her too much to do anything she didn't want.  
  
"You were.. jealous?" It was a stupid question, but she'd been through a lot that day and her mind was still busy trying to sort it all into its proper places.   
  
Gourry nodded miserably. "I know I had no right to be. You can kill me now."  
  
"Gourry?"  
  
"Yes, Lina?"  
  
"Come here."  
  
Several hours later, the four friends were sitting at a table waiting for a truly massive food order to begin arriving. All of them were rumpled and blushing and trying to pretend they didn't notice that the other three were in a similar condition. Eye contact was in danger of in danger of extinction as four pairs of eyes memorized the grain of the wood the table was made of. Several times one of the party members had taken a deep breath in preparation for speech and then sunk back into silence.  
  
"So, are you girls going to have to dress like this all the time?" Trust Gourry to innocently light a match in a fireworks factory.  
  
Lina and Amelia looked at each other. While the costumes had definitely gone a long way towards resolving certain long standing romantic issues, neither felt comfortable being so exposed. Simultaneously, the two girls said, "No."  
  
"Won't A.N.I.M.E. Central put a large bounty on your heads if you don't?" Zelgadis took a sip of his coffee and stole a peek at Amelia's outfit.  
  
"It's unjust to force women to abide by a different set of rules! The men's dress code doesn't require any kind of exposure at all." Amelia had leapt to stand on a chair and pointed her hand in the air out of habit but was pulled down quickly by Zel, who took the opportunity to put his cape around her shoulders. He liked the outfit a lot, but he didn't like other people getting to see the outfit or the way Amelia would almost fall out of it when she made sweeping arm movements.  
  
"That's right. We're going to wear these just long enough to go pay a visit to this director jerk to explain why the dress code should be repealed." Lina laughed, fangs glinting as lightning crashed outside. Miles away, Mr. Cornelius Futch shivered as a sense of impending doom crept over him.  
  
  
(And this is where I'm stopping for right now. Whether it continues depends on the feedback. Thanks to Ryo Hoshi for telling me the idea shouldn't die at the idea stage and Stara Maijka for beta reading and attempting to stem my rampant abuse of commas.) 


End file.
